How Will We Survive the Holidays?
No crowd. No travel. No overstimulation.
I’m done. Omicron has drained the holiday gatherings from their magical essence.
So I’ll turn off the lights, lit some candles, and return to my inner child through my kids.
That’s it.
I’m not giving up on hope, but I’m preserving my energy (and health.)
I’m not angry or sad or depressed, but I refuse to give in to the ever-growing pressure of having to make “the right choice” at all times for my family, every day of the year, for two years now.
So to reduce the decision fatigue, anxiety, and choice-making extravaganza, we’ll order in, unwrap presents, and watch movies.
Yes, that was the plan…
… the plan until divergent opinions made an entrance.
The plan until the “what ifs” and “we can’t live our lives as if constantly under a threat” (we are).
In the face of such dilemmas, the delicate balance between our needs for interconnectedness and individual safety fails.
The anxiety raises and so do our voices.
All hell breaks loose.
In a pandemic world in which we have to make new decisions almost daily, I’m not sure what the future holds — and by future I mean two days from now.
I don’t know if I’ll make the trip to MD to see my in-laws for Christmas, even if everyone is vaccinated (and that’s a big if), because our children aren’t. Not by choice, just because Lou is 11 days short of turning 5 and no one will agree to give her one before her birthday, and Birdie is still too young.
I’m scared for my family. I’m scared for my own health — yes, even if I got all three shots, and am relatively healthy, and the stats say that I “should” be fine.
“The only thing stronger than fear is hope,” I’ve been told by all the Hunger Games books. But I still strongly feel like I’m in the middle of the arena, wondering if I should run for the weapons or from it.
May the odds be ever in your favor…
I’ve never been great with the slightest change in my routine. A bit of OCD mixed with an instilled fear of the outside world.
I’m working on it.
But as the cliché goes, when your heart walks around outside your body in the form of cute children, it’s even more difficult to make decisions based on reason or statistics.
And “letting go of the idea of control” is blurred with hyper-vigilance and overprotection.
In the end, it has less about what we’ll choose to do on Christmas than our relationship with risk, anxiety, change and fear.
Some days, I believe they’ll get the best of me. Others, I’m beating them to the punch.
We’ll see which one wins on Saturday.
In the meantime, I still stand by my candlelight vision: sheltered from the world, holding my daughters tight.